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TRANSACTIONS NEWSLETTER ONLINE

January-February 2009

Leading the Charge on Climate Protection

Surrounded by jubilant lawmakers and other dignitaries, Governor Schwarzenegger signs into law the California Global Warming Solutions Act. (Photo: David Paul Morris / Getty images)

Rising sea levels could inundate runways at San Francisco (shown here) and Oakland international airports along with low-lying freeways. (Photo: Barrie Rokeach)

The lead word in the Draft Transportation 2035 Plan’s “Change in Motion” theme is loaded with meanings, none more urgent than the imperative to address climate change.

As the draft plan puts it, “All but a few skeptics now acknowledge that climate change is real, that it is largely caused by human activity (particularly the burning of fossil fuels), and that it can have profound consequences for our planet.”

The litany of potential local side effects from the global warming crisis is sobering: rising sea levels that could inundate Bay Area airports, seaports, and low-lying bridges and highways — not to mention vast expanses  of wetlands and shoreline property; a reduction in the Sierra snow pack, which translates to a dwindling water supply and drought; a multiplying of the region’s already troublesome wildfires; and loss of native plant and animal species.

In putting climate change front and center in the Draft Transportation 2035 Plan, MTC is responding not only to these physical threats, but also to new mandates from the state Legislature. In September 2006, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed Assembly Bill 32, the California Global Warming Solutions Act. The groundbreaking law requires reduction of statewide greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by the year 2020 — some 30 percent below business- as-usual emission levels projected for 2020.

For the Bay Area, this goal translates to reducing regional carbon dioxide emissions from a projected year 2035 level of 77,000 tons per day to 50,000 tons per day.

With about 40 percent of the region’s emissions coming from the transportation sector, MTC has its work cut out. But the depth of the problem is such that it will take a holistic approach to turn the tide. This realization prompted MTC to embrace a new partnership with its sister regional agencies: the Association of Bay Area Governments, the Bay Area Air Quality Management District, and the Bay Conservation and Development Commission. The four agencies have outlined in the Draft Transportation 2035 Plan a $400 million Transportation Climate Action Campaign to reduce the region’s carbon footprint.

The marquee element is a public outreach drive to educate Bay Area residents about how they can collectively make a big impact on greenhouse gases with modest, everyday actions, such as by keeping their tires well-inflated. Meanwhile, a Climate Grants Program will subsidize innovative demonstration projects for reducing automobile emissions. Potential beneficiaries include projects that promote the use of low-carbon alternative fuels, expand car-sharing programs or experiment with pricing.

The campaign also will provide funding to expand already successful Safe Routes to Schools programs in Alameda, Contra Costa and Marin counties, as well as to implement similar programs in other counties. Such programs aim to increase the number of children who walk or pedal to school by making the environment friendlier and by educating parents and kids about the benefits of two-legged and two-wheeled commuting to school.

Funding likewise will be beefed up for a complementary program: Safe Routes to Transit. Also helping to make riding transit more attractive is a Transit Priority Program, which would improve on-time reliability through such devices as dedicated bus lanes and bus-signal priority at intersections.

On top of the $400 million for these Climate Action Campaign outreach, education and infrastructure initiatives, the Draft Transportation 2035 Plan sets aside $45 million over the next five years for the Bay Area Air Quality Management District’s Goods Movement Emission Reductions Program. While the program targets diesel particulate matter and nitrogen oxides, it produces co-benefits by reducing emissions that contribute to climate change.

In fact, nearly every initiative and spending category in the Draft Transportation 2035 Plan offers some climate change benefits, including $1 billion over 25 years for bicycle facilities and programs, and $2.2 billion — double current levels — for MTC’s Transportation for Livable Communities Program. The Regional HOT Network also will help reduce the region’s carbon footprint, as will the Freeway Performance Initiative (see story).

Beyond the investments and strategies contained in the 2035 plan, the Bay Area may have another powerful carbon-busting weapon: stricter automobile emission standards. Regulations adopted by the California Air Resources Board in 2004 (in response to 2002’s Assembly Bill 1493 by Pavley) would require automakers to meet increasingly stringent greenhouse gas emission standards for passenger cars and light- and medium-duty trucks sold in the state starting with the 2009 model year. While the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has refused to grant a waiver that would allow California to implement its tighter standards, the state has challenged this action in federal court. Meanwhile, there are indications that the incoming Obama Administration may grant the waiver.

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